Yet there they were this week, signing fresh contracts with their former teams — Matsui with the Yankees, and McNabb with the Philadelphia Eagles — for the sole purpose of coming out of retirement so they could retire all over again.

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Jerry Rice, shown having his jersey retired in 2010, re-retired with the 49ers in 2006.Credit
Marcio Jose Sanchez/Associated Press

Increasingly, for a certain type of athlete — one who spent a large portion of his career with one team, perhaps, or who was closely identified with one city — there is another step on the career ladder: a meaningless return to a team so they can reflect on how meaningful that team was to them.

“I gave everything I had,” McNabb, choking back tears, told reporters Monday after he retired by signing a new deal with the Eagles.

The one-day contract has become a rite of passage for the modern athlete — a select few, anyway — before he retreats from the spotlight. Matsui, a former outfielder who signed his one-day deal Sunday at Yankee Stadium, was treated to an pregame ceremony behind home plate. In his final capacity as a team employee, he was responsible only for throwing out the first pitch. He wore a tie beneath his jersey.

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Hideki Matsui, a former Yankees World Series most valuable player who announced his retirement in December, made it official at Yankee Stadium on Sunday.Credit
Kathy Willens/Associated Press

“I think you can take it too seriously sometimes,” said Scott Fujita, a linebacker who retired after signing a one-day contract with the New Orleans Saints in April. “But it does make you emotional, and you feel flattered that the team would even make that sort of offer. For me, it just felt right.”

Most one-day contracts come with the time-honored tradition of a news conference, because — let’s face it — there are few things an athlete would rather do during his final day on his job than field questions from reporters. On these occasions, of course, there are softball questions galore: What did your time with the franchise mean to you? What was your favorite moment? What will you do next? More than enough smiles and handshakes to go around.

In baseball, the one-day contract is typically a minor league deal. The Yankees, for example, would have needed to clear a spot on their 40-man roster to actually sign Matsui this week, so there was a bit of stagecraft at work. An announcement that Matsui was retiring as a member of the Trenton Thunder would have carried considerably less heft, though it probably would have been more accurate.

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The ex-Giants first baseman J. T. Snow with his one-day contract in 2008.Credit
Jeff Chiu/Associated Press

After Jerry Rice spent his final seasons in the N.F.L. hopscotching from the San Francisco 49ers to the Oakland Raiders to the Seattle Seahawks, he announced his retirement in September 2005 after a training camp cameo with the Denver Broncos. One year later, after appearances on ABC’s “Dancing with the Stars” and Spike TV’s “Pros vs. Joes,” where he starred alongside luminaries like Dennis Rodman and the professional wrestler Bill Goldberg, Rice re-retired from football by signing a one-day contract with the 49ers, where he had spent the bulk of his career.

With his 1989 Super Bowl ring swinging from a chain on his neck, Rice signed a deal for $1,985,806.49, which commemorated his rookie season (1985), his uniform number (80), his retirement year (’06) and the 49ers. The sum was ceremonial, and Rice was not actually paid a cent.

If the one-day contract was once the province of elite stars, it has become far more inclusive. Consider that kickers have started to partake in the festivities. Jason Elam signed a one-day contract with the Denver Broncos in 2010, and John Kasay was feted in May after retiring — un-retiring? — as the Carolina Panthers’ career leading scorer. It mattered little that Kasay had not played since 2011, when he was playing for the Saints. He told reporters that he viewed it as an opportunity to express his gratitude to the Panthers’ fans.

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Scott Fujita signed a one-day contract with the Saints, whom he helped win a Super Bowl.Credit
Donald Miralle/Getty Images

“I can’t write 70,000 thank-you notes,” Kasay said at the time.

The San Francisco Giants sought some measure of authenticity in the curious case of J. T. Snow. A longtime first baseman with the Giants, Snow retired in 2006 after appearing in 38 games with the Boston Red Sox. Toward the end of the 2008 season, the Giants invited him back so he could retire as an official member of the team, the key word being “official.” This was no minor league deal. The Giants gave him a prorated salary of $2,100 based on the league minimum and penciled him into the starting lineup for a home game against the Los Angeles Dodgers on Sept. 27.

Snow took his defensive position before the top of the first for fielding drills, which featured his fellow infielders purposefully throwing the ball in the dirt at his ankles. It was all in good fun, though. Snow was removed from the game before the first pitch to a huge ovation.

For Fujita, the one-day contract came as a surprise. After winning a Super Bowl with the Saints in 2010, he spent the final three seasons of his career with the Cleveland Browns. But he said he always felt a special connection to New Orleans, and he was taken aback when General Manager Mickey Loomis called to ask if he would like to retire as a Saint. “It felt like the right thing to do,” Fujita said.

Rather than sit on a dais with front-office executives for a formal news conference, Fujita had something else in mind. He took an unsigned copy of the contract with him to Machu Picchu in the Peruvian Andes, which he was exploring with his former Saints teammate Steve Gleason. Fujita signed the contract, then took to Twitter to post a photograph of himself with Gleason, who has waged a public battle with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or A.L.S.

It marked the end of one journey, Fujita said, and the beginning of another.